


Derailed

by TheArtOfBlossoming



Category: Fallout (Video Games), Fallout 4
Genre: Kidnapping, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-12
Updated: 2020-10-12
Packaged: 2021-03-07 18:34:26
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,198
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26972227
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheArtOfBlossoming/pseuds/TheArtOfBlossoming
Summary: 2295Seven years after the Institute was defeated, the Commonwealth is healing under the guidance of the Minutemen of Steel and the reformed Brotherhood.Sentinel-General Vincent Nathaniel Hudson-MacCready still suffers from pre-war Post Combat Stress Syndrome, which is compounded by the fact that he had to go through the Railroad to defeat the Institute. Just don't ever say 'bullseye' near him...
Relationships: Robert Joseph MacCready/Male Sole Survivor
Comments: 3
Kudos: 10





	Derailed

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Vincent, Redefined](https://archiveofourown.org/works/8280622) by [TheArtOfBlossoming](https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheArtOfBlossoming/pseuds/TheArtOfBlossoming). 



> This story is canon with "Vincent, Undefined' and the following series "Vincent, Redefined" and takes place after the events of "I'll Carry You" and "MacCready, Redefined".

2295  
Seven years after the Institute was defeated.

It was a nowhere kind of place. One of those lost, lonely houses along a broken road, well away from the well-trodden provisioner routes, surrounded by scrubland and ancient junk and the occassional unburied body either skeletal or rad-wracked.

The scavenger was hunched over the chitinous bowl-like remains of a particularly large rad-roach, picking out the roasted flesh with fingerless gloved hands and eating it distractedly, flecks dropping into the wiry, slightly curly grey beard that hid the weathered, wrinkled neck behind it. 

Pulling out the last large, flakey morsel, he wrapped it in a plastic bag that was now devoid of its Sugarbomb innards and its cardboard armour. He swiped the grimy grey knit cap off his head and wiped a greasy hand over the bald scalp beneath. 

The radio in the corner sputtered to life. It did that sometimes, when it felt like it. He listened sometimes. When he felt like it.

The low, four and a half-legged table in front of him felt the scrape of his switchblade in its crackling varnish as the music played 'Dear Hearts and Gentle People'. _scritch, scratch_.

The radio presenter came on, advertising "… _the Commonwealth Day market at Starlight City, to be officially opened by the Sentinel-General himself._ The Scavenger perked up his ears and scratched a few more letters.

The next song froze his blade in mid-gouge. Magnolia blared out statically from the little speaker, singing "Train, Train". The old man slammed down the knife on the tabletop, scooped a barbed cane from the floor and leaned heavily on it to stand. He straightened and, out of habit, prodded the bridge of his nose with his middle finger, then quickly forced his hand down. 

A bag was lifted from the floor, disturbing dust motes and rotten splinters that fell back down, landing as softly as the footsteps that padded away from the now inscribed table. 

* * *  
"Do I really have to wear a fu..uh..fitted suit?" moaned Vin. 

"YES, Blue. We talked about this. It sends a message, remember."

"I know what message it's sending me right now," smirked MacCready from his slump on the other sofa.

"Gross," Piper muttered.

"Hey, I heard that, Pipes!" Vin exclaimed. To Mac, he said, "So it still looks good on me, hey Bun?"

"Rockin' it, handsome."

"Eurgh, would you two lovebirds cut it out while I sort this…aghh. Why d'yask _me_ to do this?"

"I didn't, Piper. You came in, said my tie was all 'skew-whiff' and took over."

"As usual…" mumbled MacCready.

"UGHH! Well..well… I give up! Bet Mr. Snarky over there can't do any better."

Mac's ears perked up at the mention of the word 'bet'. "Oh yeah? Twenty caps says I can get the neck-snake to behave."

"Thirty says you can't," challenged Piper, eyebrows raised, chin jutted forward.

"Fine. Watch me tie the perfect knot and win your thirty caps, pen-pusher."

Piper just crossed her arms and restrained herself from a biting comeback as Duncan had just entered the room. Mac was undoing the mess that Piper had made and didn't look over when he said "Hey buddy, go get changed."

Vin raised his chin for Mac to have better access and his eyebrows when he looked at his stepson. "Wow, that was quick!"

Piper smiled at the twelve year old, standing there in a small green jacket and trousers. "Well look who cleans up nicely," she said. "Jessie get some new threads in, huh?" 

"Yep. Like it, Dad?" 

Mac glanced over and nodded. "Neato. Lemme just sort out Pop's tie, then I'll help with yours."

Mac finished, kissed his husband and held out his hand toward the reporter whilst still gazing at his auburn knight. Vin looked in the tarnished silver mirror. "Perfect. Pay up Piper." When she grumbled, Vin reminded her to stop using the 'b' word in conversation with Mac.

The companions trooped out to go and find their places on the rooftop stage by the square. Starlight City was packed. Vin had never seen so many people here before. Extra stalls had been set up, selling food, drink and even Minuteman themed souvenirs. Maxson had stomped on anyone's chances of selling Brotherhood memorabilia, even if they _had_ destroyed the Institute. No, this day was, as Hancock loved to say, "Of the people, for the people" and since the Minutemen were made up of the general populace, not to mention being the native militia in these parts, Vin and his council felt that a few little pats on the back would be good for morale.

There was even an old guy in the marketplace whittling ' ..At A Minute's Notice" on pencils. Vin had bought one each for Duncan and Shaun and been too distracted to notice exactly how the old man looked up at him, watery blue eyes peering through wild, ginger-peppered grey eyebrows.

The day was a huge success. Vin managed to get a short speech out and then to get out of the suit into a T-shirt and his Atom Cats jacket by mid-afternoon. He and Mac sat drinking with Shaun, Valentine, Piper, Diesel Dan (formerly Danse), Rhys and Preston. The settlement-come-city had suffered no attacks that day and much fun was had. 

Mac sat back on their sofa, later, in their apartment above the games shop. He studied the nostalgic look on Vin's whiskey-blushed face. It had been a good fair. "I'm guessin' that reminded you of the old days?"

"Huh? Oh. No…," Vin grinned. "It was better."

* * *  
It was a routine patrol, just the two of them wandering the wasteland like in the old days. Vin had lost count of how many times he'd walked the Commonwealth. He'd planned a route that went through several 'dark spots', places on his bright green PIP-boy map that weren't criss-crossed with Brotherhood patrols and provisioner routes. 

There were always Raiders somewhere, of course, sometimes Supermutants, rarely Gunners though anymore. Even the wildlife had receded since the Institute imploded and the Minutemen of Steel had risen. So far though, this journey had been uneventful…until they found the house.

There was no roof as such, barely the remains of a second floor. A mismatched collection of planks and a tatty mildewed olive green canvas that might once have been a tent covered the hole in the ceiling.

Vin cast his detective's eye about the scene. There were signs of recent usage: pots and pans hastily shoved underneath an old sideboard, a reasonably clean yellow sleeping bag rolled up in a corner. An upturned, empty radroach shell...but it was MacCready who spotted the low wooden table on its side near the wall and flipped it over.

"What the heck's that s'posed to mean?" he muttered.

"Whad'you say?" 

" 'Does everbody assume collateral obliteration now?' Damn Raiders should cut back on the psycho," Mac chuckled.

"Say what?" 

"Raiders and psycho, man."

"No, the other thing." Vin moved over to look down at the scratched surface. His auburn brows descended in concentration, muscles in his jaw working away as he read the odd phrase until he suddenly paled.

"Dickin' fragbomb."

"Well, that's a new one…" grumbled Mac, then he realised that Vin was about to have one of his Post Combat Stress Syndrome episodes. His right arm and leg were shaking, he'd gone very pale and his breath was coming in ragged, irregular gasps.

"Heh..hey! Vin! I got you, sit down here." Mac quickly cleared rubble off the nearby staircase. His blue eyes were full of concern but alert, nonetheless, his voice gentle. When he was certain that Vin was not getting any worse, he risked asking, "What set off the shakes this time, bear?" 

Vin made an audible effort to steady his breathing until he could speak. "That phrase. Read… read the first letter of each..." he took a deep breath, "each word."

"D..E..A..C.. oh."

"It's fresh. Can't be more than a day or two old. Look, the shavings are still on the floor," Vincent pointed out. Valentine had been teaching him for years how to see with a detective's eye. He often said Vin would have made a good cop.

"He's dead, though. We saw the body. Besides, it's just a name. Two people can have the same name. Remember that guy who used to set up a bar in the craziest, middle o' nowhere places. He was a Mac. It doesn't mean…"

"But it could." Vin cut MacCready off. Carrying out Kells' orders to clear out the Railroad headquarters was one of the most difficult things he'd ever done. Admittedly, he'd joined with the sole purpose of using them to get to his son. He did enough jobs for them to gain their trust, learned how to make ballistic weave, cleared out plenty of raider hovels and supermutant strongholds.

It wasn't that Vincent had disagreed with Desdemona about rescuing synths, he just didn't understand why she wouldn't apply the same care to human beings. Deacon had admitted to him that he'd tried to talk her round, to no avail.

As it turned out, their method of operations was less innocent and more complicated than that. Rescuing H2-22 had been a very bad idea, though. Despite his wipe, the psychopathic synth had managed to wreak havoc during the now infamous 'Numan' incident …and take Mac's lower leg in the process. 

Ultimately, Vin's discomfort with the thought of rescuing a synth but removing and replacing their personality won over. He carried out his orders, mercilessly. He hoped that Glory had ended up in some kind of Synth valhalla. He'd respected her. The only other member he felt true regret over was Deacon. Vin had never really got to know him. He couldn't stand the guy's personality; he lied too much but that didn't mean that he hadn't respected his skills.

 _Hypocrite_ , Vincent reflected. _I lied by omission of the truth. I was already Brotherhood when I joined._

"Vin, VIN! Snap out of it. We've gotta move, find somewhere that's not here to bunk down for the night."

The Sentinel-General pulled himself together and stood up. "Alright, move out."

* * *  
Trudy pushed a plate of grilled radstag toward the old man, next to his Nuka Cola. "This isn't a diner, y'know greybeard. Ten caps."

A thin, grubby finger pointed vaguely toward the Diner sign outside. "That's double false advertising then. Guess that means you don't get a tip." 

Trudy grumbled something about going soft in her old age and set to cleaning up the stove. The elderly man ate half of the steak in a civilised fashion, with utensils, before picking up the other half in his hand, fingertips poking through the end of his glove and took it outside to sit on the log at the side of the road. He pulled a slim switchblade from his boot and started carving.

* * *  
Vin's boots crunched on the broken tarmac leading to Drumlin Diner. He still remembered bringing Nora here for a milkshake. These days, the only milk in the Commonwealth was the strange, thick, greenish sludge that brahmin calves glugged greedily. Ricky Gee, rest his soul had said that Appalachian Brahmin milk was creamy white and potable. Curie insisted that there must be some kind of bacterial anomaly and was working to purify the milk. Vin secretly hoped she'd succeed and soon. He really missed his dairy products.

"Come back down to Earth, spaceman!"

"Huh? Oh. I'm here."

"Yeeeaaahh.. I think somebody _else_ was here, earlier," said Mac, pointing his rifle barrel toward the log. 

Vin read the freshly carved words: 'Disappearing, Enigmatic, Alluring Charmer Or Nobody?'

"Somebody having a personal crisis?"

"Maybe," said Vin, taking MacCready's joke seriously. "Let's go talk to Trudy."

The trader told them that an old scavver came by a couple of days ago and traded stories for a Nuka Cola. Said he couldn't drink anymore, that he'd shot his liver. That Nuka Cola was the only thing that kept him awake. It sounded like Sheffield, the tramp from Diamond City that Vin had given a job to eight years ago. The only thing was, that old scruff had died last year.

* * *

Just outside Concord, they spotted a loaded brahmin and a figure dressed in an old Postman's uniform with a combat helmet on headed toward them. All settlement provisioners were Minutemen, complete with a dress code. They had to wear a Postman's uniform, hat or both to be easily identifiable.

This woman, Darryl, smiled at her General and Major as they approached. 

"Sirs, how ya doin'?"

"Darryl, yeah we're good thanks. You need anything?"

"To find a decent cobbler? No, I'm good. Oh, hey I uh…I bought this at this fair an' didn't really look until later. Thought you should see it."

The brahmin mooed and nudged one of its heads gently up against MacCready, who scratched its closer chin as he watched.

The provisioner handed Vin a commemorative pencil. "Look here: on one side it says ''…At a Minute's Notice' but on another, it says:  
Death Ended A Collaboration Of Nobodies." Weirdsville, huh?

"Yeah. Weirdsville," Vin muttered and pocketed the pencil, giving Darryl a few rounds of ammo in exchange.

Mac didn't hear a peep out of Vin until they were in sight of Sanctuary bridge. The guard at the post saw them, waved them hurriedly on and turned to shout something to the figure behind him, who came running at full pelt. The two men broke into a jog and Marcy Long crashed into Vin's chest. Her face was red and wet with tears, her tone urgent and frantic.

"Jun got hurt bad but he's still out there, oh, your boy's still out there! He's gone, I'm so sorry Vincent! MacCready I don't.. oh.."

Mac grabbed Marcy roughly by the shoulders. His tone was low, ominous, just loud enough to shock her into listening but not to carry too far. "Pull yourself together, Long." Mac spoke through gritted teeth. 'Where? When?"

Marcy sobbed. "My Jun…he's in the clinic, they were mirelurk hunting across the lake, went out three hours ago…" Marcy drew shuddering breaths, "he turned up by the purifiers just ten minutes ago, alone. He's been unconscious since…" 

MacCready shoved her away and ran as fast as his prosthetic leg allowed, around the corner to the clinic. Vin put an arm around Marcy's shoulder and they jogged after him. They heard Mac shouting a house away.

"Wake him UP Curie, dammit! We need to find our SON!" 

"Monsieur MacCready, 'e is 'eavily sedated for ze pain."

"We're losing TIME, here, Am. Wake. Him. Up."

Vin appeared in the doorway. "Consider that an order, Doctor," Vin added, his voice level but weighted with authority.

"Oui, very well but you 'ave ten minutes only. Comprendez-vous?"

"What caused his injuries?"

"Mostly Razorclaw but Monsieur Long 'as one clean bulletwound through 'is calf."

Vin nodded and moved forward, placing a hand on Mac's shoulder, firmly guiding him to sit. "Let me ask the questions, Mac."

Jun's eyes fluttered open and he started groaning in pain, despite the Med-X. Vin gently took his hand.  
"Jun, hey friend. Where did you two go?"

"Mirelurk nest, n…north bank. More violent than usual, faster…I got shot, fell over, sound riled up the 'lurks, more, one surprised me, couldn't see shooter…I...heard your boy fire three shots, saw a 'lurk go down. I told him to run..home. Like we always promise, 'things go south, go home'. B.. by the time I got free o' the razorclaw I..I couldn't see him. Is he back?"

"No, Jun." Mac said coldly. Vin added, "North bank, what, near the older raider hut?"

"Up that way….didn't get back? Oh noooo…not your boy…"

Mac was already up and out of the door, ringing the bell. Minutemen came running and he ordered a 'downed-man' sweep around both sides of the bank.

Vin nodded to Curie and rushed out. He took Mac's elbow and they ran, making a bee-line for the north bank then turned slightly to the right. One mirelurk razorclaw limped its way along the shoreline. Vin took it out with his silenced shotgun and signaled to Mac to sneak. 

MacCready's hearing was almost as keen as his eyesight and he caught a child's voice on the wind, as raindrops began to fall, tapping out an uneven rhythm on the brim of his hat. Rifle readied, he crept around to a higher vantage point, though still downhill of the cabin. Vin watched him put the scope to his eye and saw the change in his expression as he spotted their son, relief mixed with caution. Vin looked through his own scope. He could just see the top of the boy's head past the back of another figure. A man in a dirty, patched, tattered trench coat, wearing a grey knit cap. A grey, curly, wiry beard wagged. He couldn't see much more from this position, except for the flash of a handgun that waved as the figure gesticulated in his conversation.

The two belly-crawled up the slope as quietly as they could. They could hear the man speaking now, an unmistakeable voice from years ago. He was playing Blast Radius with the kid.

"A Bullseye!"

"Y..you rolled a one, mister. That's not so good. Anyway I think its called 'snake eye'.

"No Shaun, that's two die, two ones. I wasn't talking about my diceroll anyway." 

Vin heard a chair creak as the man turned.

"I was talking about your dad, here."

The watery, pale blue gaze that met Vincent's through a crack in the shack boards hit him like a cryogrenade.

"Come on up, _Bullseye_ , join in the game! Your boy's winning so far.

MacCready moved past Vin to confront the man directly. He looked at the boy, their son, _his_ son, Duncan. Not Shaun, who was practically an adult and safe on the Prydwen. That fact nudged Vin out of his momentary paralysis, enough to lower the barrel of Mac's rifle and get a verbal shot in first.

"You used to be better at gathering intel, **Deacon**. 

"What, not your son?" he asked, puzzled, pushing the woollen hat off his head to scratch his scalp. He barely looked like himself. The sunglasses were absent, the crows feet at the corners of those pale blue eyes were deep, made all the more obvious by the dark circles and red-rimmed eyelids. He was no longer entirely bald but a sad wispy remnant of ginger-speckled wavy hair clung to the base of his skull like a drowning man with one arm over the last piece of flotsam.

His wavy grey beard was flush to his jaw but stuck out of his chin like a neglected topiary, the lantern light in the shack catching the one or two flecks of ginger that remained.

Deacon looked old, honestly old, Vin realised. There was no disguise this time, no veneer of slick confidence. Without those cheaters in front of his eyes, he couldn't hide a thing.

"He _is_ our son, just not the one you thought you'd caught."

Vin's fingertips were still on the lowered barrel of Mac's rifle. He could feel his husband shaking with the effort of staying quiet.

"Duncan, move toward me slowly, son."

He wasn't bound by anything save fear of the strange old man and did as his Pop told him to. Deacon just watched, a puzzled look on his face.

"Well, you got my invitation at least but there wasn't a 'plus one'."

Vin reached out to take Dunc's hand and as he pulled him behind his back, let go and signed the letters B and U to Mac. 'Get Backup', the silent order said. "Take Duncan home, Mac. I need to have a private conversation." Mac's glance was loaded with concern but Vin's resolve-face countered it.

Deacon grinned. "Duncan. That's a half-decent name, boy. Good game, by the way." Looking at MacCready, he said, "It's alright, you can go, Gunnerboy."

Mac scowled at him but bit his tongue, scooping Duncan behind him and backed off slowly until they were out of sight.

Deacon made a show of lowering his weapon and opening his coat to be clear that he wasn't armed. Vin noticed the barbed walking cane nearby but the old Railroad operative didn't acknowledge it. Vin moved in a little closer and sat down slowly across from him.

The two men studied each other for a long moment until Vin broke the silence.

"I killed you."

"I wasn't dead, I _**lied**_. I _told_ you I did that."

Each man took a few careful breaths.

"No, you killed poor ol' Stan Wicks. Guy was a gonner anyway, his insides were rotting. I got him a facejob done, groomed him for a while, y'know. Guy coulda been a comedian. Did a pretty good caricature of me, I have to say. Even fooled Des. I was saving him for a special occassion. So, when I got wind our Bullseye might be off the mark, I installed him at H.Q. Just in time."

Vin remained silent.

"Okay, okay, permit me a little curiosity here. I've been wanting to ask you for years, why didn't you ever take up with me? I kept offering my wonderful company."

Vin answered, matter-of-factly, "I used to be a Staff-Sergeant. I've got a nose for good whiskey, half-decent cigars and bullshitters."

"Ooh, you see now, that's the kind of quality banter I missed out on. Bet you saved that all for Gunnerboy, huh?"

"Don't. Call. Him. That."

"Bingo. Hit a nerve. Like being Brotherhood is any different to being a Gunner…"

Vin jerked in his seat but restrained himself from reacting. Deacon was trying to get a rise out of him and he wouldn't comply.

"You know full well it is, Deacon. Lying… that was the Railroad's downfall. Compartmentalisation and omission of truth." Vin leaned forward ever so slightly as he spoke. Deacon's lips remained closed, a thin, exhausted line.

"I never understood why they saved synth bodies, tore out their occupants and put new tenents in their place. Whole personalities, people, gone! Wiped! And they said they were saving them. They were _killing_ them." Vin paused to study Deacon's reaction: one eyelid twitched traitorously. He continued.

"How did they choose which 'new personality' got to live, huh? Where did those… souls... even come from? It wasn't just the Institute kidnapping people, was it? The Railroad was doing it too and blaming the Institute. Or did Desdemona and Carrington keep you out of that particular loop? Amari certainly didn't know. She was shocked to see the evidence that Valentine and I dug up. Take a trip to the Prydwen with me and you can see for yourself."

Deacon had paled at this, yet something told Vin this wasn't entirely news to him.

"And tell me, why would Des never save human beings? She lost a kid, didn't she? Sam, wasn't it? Lost 'em to a human being." Vin remembered the little toy shrine in a corner of the catacombs and Desdemona's last words.

Deacon sat back, breathing deeply. "Nice detective work, Hudson. Yeah. She did. She lost almost all faith in human beings. I heard her say something once about Rebirthing, some ultimate plan the Institute had for putting themselves in synth bodies, only Des wanted to get there first. I didn't understand at the time but it all makes a horrible sense now. I suspected, y'know? Always knew she wasn't as altruistic as she made out. I was tryin' to work it from the inside but then you came stomping along with your string o' can chimes and derailed everything."

"I betrayed you."

"You're damn right you did. Betrayed yourself as well huh, _Bullseye_ , Deacon spat.

"And paid for it." Vin looked at his past acquaintance straight in the eye, hiding nothing. That wasn't his way. In Deacon's gaze, he saw defeat, fragility, used-up anger and surrender. "Enough with the games and codenames. Who are you, really?"

"It's stupid. I outgrew it."

"Tell me."

Deacon sighed, raised his eyebrows and tilted his head in that oh so familiar way. "Johnny Deathclaw. That's what get when your mother's an ex-raider but still wants her sweet little man to instill fear in the hearts of his enemies whilst being a hep cat. What can I say?"

"I see why you dropped it. So what do you go by now?"

"I try to avoid labelling myself."

"Let me try asking that again. You can address me as Sentinel-General or just General Hudson. What shall I call you now?"

"Well, _General_ … yeah, I hear your full name is quite a mouthful. Let's see… Sentinel-General Vin.. not Vinnie? Vince? No. Vincent, Nate (short for Nathaniel), Hudson-MacCready. Or is that surname the other way round? Whew! I don't envy you signing things off.

Me? I think I'll stick with Deacon. It's like a stain I can't get out, anyway."

"Alright, Deacon. What is it you want?"

"Well, at first it was vengeance, of course, served cold… I was going to attack you with a Cryolator! Too soon? Still? Ah.. My bad. Anyway then you really threw me. Apparently, Buckethead-you didn't shoot any Lanterns on your way through Bunker Hill. I heard that from one of the synths you let go. They found the Courser body there too. I figured maybe you were just new to the Brotherhood or maybe you were going to joyride the Prydwen an' let it burn but nope." 

Deacon reached for the walking cane, causing Vin to raise his shotgun. Deacon raised his left hand in surrender. "Just need to stand up, my old bones are complaining. Need a prop these days, " he explained. Vin nodded and rose too, lowering his gun when he could see that Deacon was genuinely leaning heavily on it. He lived with a one-legged man and knew that stance well.

"So what is you want from me now, Deacon? Why go to the trouble of kidnapping our son and attacking our friend?"

"Oh…ohhhh…thaaat wasn't my best plan ever. Feeding psycho to mirelurks, one star on the recommended pet food guide. Sorry I shot your friend, I was just trying to get Mr. Snippy away from the kid. He's a good shot, by the way. Figures, seein' who his dads are. Dads…doesn't that get confusing? How d'you know which dad the kid's yelling for?"

Vin quirked an eyebrow. "Focus, Deacon. What do you want from me?"

"I want you to help me solve a puzzle. _You_ , you're the puzzle. So you let those… what d'you call 'em now, Genthrees? Sounds kinda like 'gentry', the gentry of the Commonwealth. That makes them sound all upper class, now, doesn't it?"

" Synth's a dirty word these days. Gen three was better received. Go on."

"Oh yeah. Right. So I went deep undercover. By which I mean just letting my hair grow. Sunglasses broke and I didn't feel like getting another pair. Hiding in plain sight, that was the plan."

"Being yourself, for a change?"

Deacon shrank into himself a little. "I don't think I know how to do that anymore. I am… whoever people take me for, I guess," he shrugged. "Who am I to you, General?"

"I won't lie," Vin warned.

"I don't think _you_ know _how_ , anymore. Hit me."

Vin drew a deep breath. "You're a worn out, crazy old man who's had his idealistic rug pulled out from under his feet. Things aren't what you thought they were but you suspected something was off. Now, well, you're officially dead and you don't belong anywhere and have nothing to fight for," he drew more breath to continue, "…and those who might have been able to give you a purpose, can't. Because you taught them that they could never trust you. To put it bluntly, Johnny D., you're fucked."

"Bullseye.…sorry. I meant 'touché'." Deacon twitched away in defense, hand up. "You're not wrong, Hudson. But you've achieved what we thought we were trying to. Heck, your son - the other one - he's a synth kid, right?"

"Wrong. You don't have all the puzzle pieces. Shaun's seventeen now. We used that twisted technology to put things right for him, gave him adult body. He's Brotherhood now, a Scribe, studying to become a Proctor. Yes, Maxson knows. Unlike Desdemona's Railroad, the Brotherhood and Minutemen of Steel learned to accept Genthrees as people in their own right, as refugees, victims of mishandled science. We didn't choose to use force to make them fit into our ideal of society nor destroy them. We chose compassion and changed our perspective to accomodate their needs. I only wish that Des had been able to listen like Maxson eventually did. Not saying it was easy, though. It took years."

Deacon twisted his grip to and fro on his walking cane handle. His jaw moved side to side, an involuntary twitch. For once, Vincent's arm and leg didn't shake at all when he spoke of the tactical move he'd been forced to make.

"I ran out of time, Deacon but as much as I wanted to talk them round, I know now that I only ever had a slim chance to convince Glory or you, none of the others. Maybe not even Glory. I always regretted killing 'you'. Made it as quick as I could for them. For Stan. Now I'm doing what I can for all the people of the Commonwealth, human, ghoul or Genthree. Your fight's over, Deacon."

The ex-Railroad agent sat again, heavily. "Guess I always did have bad luck choosing gangs. I think… I think Barbara would have liked you." Vin didn't know who he was talking about but kept silent. "You derailed me, Vin. Sorry, General. He picked up the pen from the table and scribbled onto the Blast Radius score card. "Look. The word 'derailed' has the word 'liar' in the middle, just backward. Take that out, you're left with the word 'deed'. You always did tell your truth by the deeds you did, didn't you. Never outright lied."

"Never told you I was already Brotherhood when you recruited me."

"Maybe I just let that one slide." Deacon sighed. "Guess you better finish me, then."

Vin frowned, the right hand corner of his mouth quirking upward. "I'm not killin' you again. We don't murder our own."

Deacon, for once, was lost for words at that.

"No. Worse." He let Deacon stew on that for a moment. "I sentence you to face Marcy Long and a very pissed off MacCready-Hudson. Think the museum in Concord even has some stocks. After that, I'm sure I can find suitable work for you, far away from here."

Deacon had now been utterly stripped of his armour. He now wore something that Vincent had never seen on him before: humility.

"Thankyou, sir."

"I want you gone, understood? So we never see each other again, Deacon."

He made that habitual motion again, of sliding his middle finger up the bridge of his nose to push up sunglasses that were no longer there.

He nodded. "Your wish is my…strong recommendation."

\-------------

**Author's Note:**

> NOTES
> 
> Previously published as part of the OCtober challenge collection 'Pic 'n' Fics' in my works under the Prompt title 'Grudge (Rainy Day)'


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